English Mother's Day Thoughts

"it was kind of exhausting running after two babies. Still, looking back I see the pleasure of it. That’s when I began to know women very well—as co-workers, really...If I hadn’t spent that time in the playground, I wouldn’t have written a lot of those stories"

"She was not, herself, hugely in favor of motherhood in general. Obviously it was necessary, but it wasn’t exactly difficult. Even cats managed it. But women acted as if they’d been given a medal that entitled them to boss people around. It was as if, just because they’d got the label which said “mother,” everyone else got a tiny part of the label that said “child”"

"I realized that while women may seem like regular individuals, mothers are nothing short of divine embodiment. They transcend the ordinary, not only navigating life's challenges but also contending with the forces of nature in relentless devotion to their children"

"Just as the reward for honouring father and mother is very great, the punishment for transgressing it is very great. And the one who afflicts his parents causes the shechinah [presence of God] to separate from him and harsh decrees fall upon him and he is given many sufferings. And even if life smiles on him in this life, he will surely be punished in the World to Come"

"Everywhere the need exists for maternal sympathy and help, and thus we are able to recapitulate in the one word motherliness that which we have developed as the characteristic value of woman. Only, the motherliness must be that which does not remain within the narrow circle of blood relations or of personal friends; but in accordance with the model of the Mother of Mercy, it must have its root in universal divine love for all who are there, belabored and burdened"

"You should not speak arrogantly to your mother; that causes hatred for you. You should not question the words of your mother and your personal god . The mother, like Utu , gives birth to the man"

"Happy he With such a mother! faith in womankind Beats with his blood, and trust in all things high Comes easy to him, and though he trip and fall, He shall not blind his soul with clay"

"Myra subsided into outraged and sulky silence. Her romantic dream of motherhood had been riven into sharp-edged fragments by late-night feedings, constant diaper washing, and a baby who persisted in looking and acting like a baby, not like a young hero"

"I do not care who it is, any child that turns on their mother is living in a terrible, terrible confusion. The earth is our mother. We must take care of the earth"

"The modern mother who is beginning to find that the rearing of children is the most difficult of all professions, more difficult than engineering, than law, or even than medicine itself. But along with this conviction comes the search for facts which will help them"

"Wives haven't enough to do today. Scientific mass production has made their tasks so easy that they are overburdened with time. They utilize this time in destroying the happiness of their children"

"The bravest battle that ever was fought; Shall I tell you where and when? On the maps of the world you will find it not; It was fought by the mothers of men"